I presume by 1k event in Dublin, you are going to the Irish Winter Festival? Will be there also, playing side events. GL!

Yeah that's the one. I'm not going any more as I've got a friend visiting London that weekend now. GL, hope you bink something.

Last night I played £1/£2, £2/£5, £5/£10(!) all at the Empire, and won at all of them, though not for crazy amounts. No especially interesting hands though I did see some awful bits of etiquette which I feel a need to vent about.

First off, our £2/£5 got bumped up to a £5/£10 at the request of a whale, who wanted more action, and the whole table agreed. The whale then left a short time later and a bunch of regs instantly called the floor and tried to make the game smaller. I'm all for bumhunting (it's the only way to make good money playing live poker, ldo), but when it's this brazen it can only be bad for the game.

Then there was a kid who folded pre to a couple of backraises which ended up all in, called one of the whales a terrible player (or something similar), and told him pretty rudely and forcefully that the other guy can only have AA in that spot. True enough, the other guy had a monster (KK), the whale busted and left. I don't think I really need to elaborate on why this kid is clearly a ****ing idiot.

All pretty tilting behaviour from regs imo.

I don't see too much wrong with the bolded part. If the whale was the only one that wanted the game at 5/10 then I don't see it as bad etiquette for the game to go back to what it was before when that player leaves, doesn't matter if he's a whale or not. I wouldn't bring it up while he was still around the table, but I imagine the game would have to go back to 2/5 or it would probably break, then nobody is happy.

Obv the second part is terribad and would tilt the hell out of me too.

This is a fair point. Two things I should have mentioned though - the whale was still in the room, and another whale replaced him in the £5/£10 and it was very obvious to him what was going on.

One reg did say that he didn't care but if it was £2/£5 then we might get more players and the game would last longer, which I think is a reasonable argument.

Cool thread. Interesting read. Post more hands!

No real point in playing at Stars.FR unless you are like an MTT grinder and want to add all the FR tourneys to your schedule, because the rake is ****ing horrible. GL!

I deposited €500 euro over the summer just to grind out the max first deposit bonus... The rake is bigger, but with the first deposit bonus, VPP rakeback, and decent winrate from fish, the cash games were still very profitable. The regs were nitty and exploitable, really very ABC. I cashed out after i grinded the full bonus... HIT N RUN FTW

Whales used to play higher anyway... i don't think a £5/10 at Empire can really run when ppl don't carry much cash there or don't keep at the cage

they were reg. fish from Empire or just showed up?

tyty you'll see a hand or two at the end of this post...

this

Yeah I agree £5/£10 at Empire is unsustainable. Fun when it runs though.

Both were guys who have shown up here and there since £2/£5 started running a few months ago.

Last night I didn't run great!

I started off by getting in a lot of money preflop with AA vs KK and QQ and QQ hitting a set with not much behind. I then won a flip AK vs 66 to get a little back.

Then the following (lol) hand occurred:

Two limps and a young nitty guy who has been playing a few more hands than usual tonight raises to 30 in the CO, I 3bet to 80 on the BTN with T8ss, SB calls, a limper calls, and CO folds.

Flop 5-7-9ss. SB donks 60, I shove 400, he snaps.

Turn Q

River 6s

I show the straight flush, he shows KJo.

So, that was nice.

Then I lose all my money aipf vs a non-nit (the guy I doubled up with AK vs 66 earlier) with KK vs AA. gg.

I lost a couple of buy-ins but played good overall. I was on my last orbit when I busted though which is annoying. Happens though I guess. I'll be back at it tomorrow most likely, though I may play some PLO for a change of pace.

well, keep it up! try The Hippodrome, they are playing now £1/2 PLO, bit low for me but prolly playing like morons (and report, haha)

best!

Ty. Yeah PLO only runs sporadically at the Hippo but its always a very good game.

Last night I played £2/£5 again, ran very well overall, and won a bit. I was up massive at one point but then lost a big flip. Can't win 'em all I guess .

The big hands were KK>KQ on K high flop, doubling with flush over flush vs a good reg, and 75>JJ on 763 (the last hand was marginal, though I have some very aggro history with villain).

The biggie I lost was 67cc<KQ on Q53cc in a 3bet pot vs aggro villain. I raise/called his flop cbet. Pretty standard I guess.

I made some marginal folds after that, all of which I'm happy with (apart from one...).

Today is going to involve no poker. I'm off for a night out with the gf. I'll be back at it on Friday.

As I've been playing so much at the Empire I'm going to try and make their cash race. It's worth about £600 iirc (assuming no edge in the tourney, which I obv feel I have) so it's probably worth shooting for at this point. They've had £2/£5 every night I've been there too so it's one of the better places for me to play anyway.

Today I played £2/£5, played good, ran amazingly, won every 3bet pot, booked a big win, then went drinking. I think we can all agree that is a pretty good day. Tomorrow I will play MTTs unless I'm too hungover (very possible). We'll seee

how about some numbers?

Yeah I'll start giving more numbers for wins/losses. I didn't want to before because I didn't want for it to look like a brag but on reflection that's ******ed. I haven't looked at my records but I think I'm up around £6k for the month so far. A good week and this will be my best poker month ever so let's gogogogo!

Yesterday was mostly a write-off due to hangover. Today I feel fresh and ready to play though. Tomorrow I will probably play the £250 PLO8 at the Vic. I know I keep saying that I'll play this tourney and that and then decide against it but this time I think I will actually play. PLO8 is a great donkament game imo, I'm a big fan. Only the juiciest of £2/£5 games will keep me away.

Degeneracy

Yesterday was one of the most degen nights I've had in a while.

It began normally enough. I played a few hours of £1/£2 at the Empire and won £300 playing solid. I then went to the Vic to play event one of the UK Omaha Series. I busted straight after the first break, getting most of my stack in pre with KKds vs JT64 and he flopped trips.

Still up a couple of hundred for the day, and feeling pretty tired, I began to go home. I then decided to pop by the Empire to see how the games were. I sat in a deepish £1/£2, won a biggish pot with KK, but then got rivered AK<A2 vs a fish. I then doubled my short-stack all in blind vs another shorty (he was blind too. 64>84).

At this point I get a seat on the £2/£5, which looked a very good game, and I decided to take it. I was very card-dead for long stretches but I played with a lot of discipline. The guy to my right was drinking and bought me a few (ty sir) and the table was a lot of fun. I was breaking even for the night when I lost KK<AJ aipf.

So, all in all, I played for about 15 hours, played tired, tilted for a small stretch, started drinking, lost £350. Considering one of my underlying goals is to start being more professional I think that counts as a fail. I did play good though, apart from the all in blind nonsense.

Semi-interesting spot:

The guy in the BB has his hand mucked pre for some reason I can't remember. I am UTG+1 (£650) with AKs. I make it £15. MP calls and BTN thinks for a few seconds and then pops it to £70. BTN is an older guy who is sitting deep, I haven't played with him before but I've seen him be fairly aggro pre-flop (3 and 4-betting a decent amount, he 5-bet shoved one hand and got a fold).

Does anyone here like 4-betting small, like £150, to induce spaz?

Also here's some serious FPS:

4 handed, SB raises to £20, I call with A2dd. Flop 688. Check check. Turn 7. He checks, I bet £30, he raises to £100, I call. River A. He checks, I shove for £250, he folds.

SB is young, very aggro, has been drinking, and when folding to in SB is opening near 100%. I bet the turn for value and called his cr as he would lead flop or turn with any decent hand. On the river I just hoped he had something, lol. He said he had K high though.

As you seem like a pretty experienced London grinder, where do you recommend someone who is new to live poker (me) to begin? I've only been to the Fox and the Empire before and have only had bad experiences (grumpy dealers, poor rulings etc)...

If you've had bad experiences in those places then I would probably recommend the Vic. Their dealers are in general pretty well trained, the floor rulings are normally fair and there's a good selection of games to choose from.

Staff can be a little bit grumpy all over London in my experience, there's a lot of black humour and cynicism but I guess that goes with the territory to some extent.

Maybe you got a bad dealer or a caught someone on a bad day at the Empire because I actually think their dealers are pretty good. They get a lot of drunks, walk ins, tourists etc there and so most of them know how to accommodate inexperienced players. That said, there's a couple of supervisors who are really really awful but I'm sure that's the same in most places.

Sorry if I rambled a bit, hope it helped.

Played another session last night and won ~£700 without really playing any big pots. The table was relatively tough I guess. It was still just about worth playing in though.

I got sort of owned in a couple of pre-flop spots . I 4-bet bluffed the most aggro pre-flop player and he 5-bet bluffed me right back haha. I also missed what would have been a very good 4-bet and flatted instead on a couple of occasions.

I probably played my B-game all in all. Not as good as the last week or so where I really have felt sharp. I'll try harder today!!

So, in the last few days I've played two sessions, neither of them especially long, with one small win and a bigger loss. I played a little meh in the losing session, but ran bad too.

For the rest of the week I want to play a lot before Thursday, when I'm going to take some time out to see some friends and to look more seriously at volunteering at something. It was one of my initial goals at in the OP and I haven't really done much about it.

These were my initial goals:

I would say that, out of these eight points:

I'm doing very well at three of them. I'm playing £2/£5 regularly and doing well, I'm playing more hours than before, and my social life hasn't suffered overmuch.

I will give myself half marks at another three. I've tilted less (though it has happened), my NL game has improved (but I haven't joined a training site), and I have played some tournaments (but I bricked them all...).

Two have been big fails. I haven't tried much to get in better home games or to volunteer.

Not too bad for three month's work, but I can do much better.

Any updates? Empire 2-5 still running?

Does the empire have a twitter profile as well?

Interesting to read. Also a grinder from London. Usually play the Fox 1/1 and 1/2 games as well as the sparing Empire 1/2 game. Haven't got down to the Vic nearly as much as I should. Keep it up mate.

updates?

How have you not mentioned aspers? I'm guessing location is the only reason.. It's mostly (incredibly soft) £1/£1 which plays like the empire £1/2 a lot of the time and most days there's a £1/2 game which seems to turn into £2/5 when the whales arrive in the evening. The room is well-run and clientele are fun to play with. I find empire a painful collection of depressed-looking "grinders" in headphones and hoodies all jacked up on poker attitude. Aside from the comfortable chairs, that place has no other redeeming value imo.